SPROUT
Client: New York City Housing Authority & Center for Justice Innovation
Location: Polo Grounds Towers: 2931 Frederick Douglass Blvd, New York, NY 10039
Services: Community Engagement, CoDesign, Fabrication, and Install
Sprout is a neurodiverse playscape created with the Polo Grounds community to provide a safe space for all people to play, dream, inspire, converse, and come together at the Polo Grounds Houses in Harlem, NY. The project is a part of the Mayor’s Action Plan for Neighborhood Safety that was organized by the Polo Grounds neighborhood stakeholder team (NSTAT) along with the Center for Innovative Justice to create a community project reimagining public safety and wellbeing through space activation. We co-designed this neurodiverse playscape with the Polo Grounds community through a variety of play workshops. Community members of all ages participated and shared their ideas, stories, experiences, desires, and more to shape the overall design of Sprout. The process became not only a conversation around design but around what neurodiversity, mental health, and safety meant to the community.
“Vibrant, inclusive public spaces make communities safer. This playscape is the product of the city government investing in the expertise of residents who know what they need to thrive.”
The first piece serves as a quiet space that is further away from the other three pieces, each containing kinetic elements. As the stems emerge up from the work, they reveal reflective color-changing leaf-like pieces that can be spun. Creating an interactive moment for the user to manipulate their surroundings with the colorful viewports. Wrapping the platforms at the base are words of affirmation that were selected by the community. Words like ‘discover’, ‘support’, ‘connect’, and others provide opportunities for personal reflection and open conversations between residents. The pastel cool color tones of the benches provide a relaxing, visual element while the surface patterns give the user optional seating conditions through physical touch. Sprout not only provides a place to play but also an opportunity for communal connection among the Polo Grounds residents, giving them a new space to converse, learn, and grow from one another.
The project repurposes four decaying benches that existed on the grounds and focuses on turning them into an open-ended play experience for all. The multisensory work uses various textures, colors, reflections, movements, sounds, and scales to create an engaging open-ended experience to accommodate a user’s preference. The design of the four pieces is meant to appear as if they are sprouting up from the ground, hinting that this work is just the beginning of more to come. The various heights of Sprout give the opportunity for the user to manipulate their environment, whether alone or with a fellow resident.
“We are excited that the community is at the forefront of this project highlighting the importance of neurodiversity and equitable play spaces on NYCHA campuses and overall urban planning as a practice.”
